Every year, Spotify Wrapped shows up — and every year, people talk about it. They share it. They take pride in it. They tell everyone their “listening age,” unprompted. Recaps are not inherently special, but Spotify’s feel personal. Instead of summarizing activity or simply sharing stats, the company is using all its user data to reinforce a relationship on a deeper level. Spotify Wrapped is the visible outcome of an experience that feels meaningful, worthwhile and relevant, extending well beyond a single year-end moment.
For event marketers, this approach is the key to retaining attendees: Build an experience that reinforces expectations from start to finish — from how the event is positioned, to how engagement is sustained throughout the year, to how its meaning is reflected back at them afterward.
Why Retention Is Getting Harder
Historically, events benefited from highly loyal audience segments (particularly baby boomers) who returned year after year. That loyalty isn’t disappearing overnight, but it is aging out. Retention must outpace retirement — and right now, it’s the other way around. Millennials now make up the largest segment of the workforce — and Gen Z is gaining share of your audience pool. Both bring different expectations around relevance, experience and value than boomers. These groups are more selective, more time-constrained and quicker to reassess whether an event is worth returning to.
What’s an event marketer to do? Double down on your retention strategy.
What Strong Retention Strategies Have in Common
No matter the industry or audience, all events and meetings share three core characteristics when it comes to effective retention strategies:
1. Recognition is personal, not generic.
Spotify doesn’t thank users for listening — it translates behavior and data into identity. “You’re a late-night listener.” “You had a summer of throwbacks.” The focus is on the user, rather than the platform. That’s what deepens the connection.
Event marketing often stops short of resonating with an attendee’s identity. Post-show messaging thanks them for attending, but rarely acknowledges why they came, how they engaged or what the experience means about them. When recognition reinforces identity, relevance isn’t questioned.
Imagine that a week after returning from your event, each attendee receives a personalized snapshot of their experience. Buyers who prioritized commerce see insights like “You’re a Shelf Scout — top 8% for time spent in Emerging Brands and New Product Showcase.” Meanwhile, attendees focused on education would get “You’re a Deep Learner — you doubled down on the ideas that mattered most to you. What are you doing with them now?”
Instead of a generic thank-you, insights that speak to identity and motivation reinforce the value that your event offers — and why it’s worth coming back.
2. Data translated into meaning.
Spotify Wrapped is built entirely on data, yet it doesn’t feel analytical. It reflects what matters most to each user — it doesn’t tell us we listened to a lot of music, it tells us we spent the year rotating between rap and opera. That specificity is what makes it feel relevant (and fun).
An attendee who shared that their top priority last year was finding new suppliers shouldn’t receive a generic “registration is open, we hope to see you again” email. Instead, they should receive an email highlighting what’s new this year (using dynamic content) to help them source better. Registration is still the ask, but relevance leads.
Returning attendees (outside of true loyalists) commit when that relevance becomes clear — and that clarity comes from specific content, like new exhibitors aligned to their goals or relevant experts they can access.
When insight shapes and evolves marketing messaging, attendees feel understood, perceive the event as relevant — and see returning as necessary.
3. Community is built by design, not chance.
Strong retention strategies don’t just encourage return attendance; they create a sense of belonging that extends beyond a single event cycle.
Spotify Wrapped works because it reflects individual behavior and it creates a shared cultural moment. You’re part of something others experienced, too, at the same time.
Events often talk about community, but loyalty weakens when that sense of connection only exists on-site. Retention strengthens when attendees feel connected to each other — and to the event — before and after they arrive.
Closing the loyalty loop means designing experiences that reinforce continuity. This can show up in how returning audiences are acknowledged, how shared narratives are built year over year or how the event creates structured ways for people to connect around what matters to them.
Take Grace Hopper Celebration’s approach to networking. Rather than leaving connections to chance, attendees are matched around shared topics and challenges. Those conversations create value in the moment, but more importantly, they establish relationships and context that carry forward, making return attendance feel like a continuation, not a reset.
Let’s Make 2026 the Year of Retention
Luckily, we don’t have to wait until the end of an event cycle or year to apply these lessons. Events that make people feel seen like Spotify Wrapped does won’t be chasing retention; they will earn it through relevance, recognition and connection. When attendees see themselves reflected in the experience, returning is the obvious next move.
